Mike Tyson has been cheerfully playing himself in recent years in the Hangover and Scary Movie films, Rocky Balboa and Grudge Match. But in a newly developing biopic, Jamie Foxx is set to take on the mantle of the controversial former heavyweight champion of the world. Foxx's manager Rick Yorn is currently putting the as-yet untitled project together.
Terence Winter (The Wolf Of Wall Street, Boardwalk Empire, The Sopranos) is writing the screenplay, although details of his particular angle of approach are not yet known.
Tyson's life is a gift for any screenwriter. His rise as a boxer was stratospheric: he won numerous prestigious belts by the time he was 20; won his first 19 professional bouts by knockout, 12 of them in the first round; and was Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of the World by the time he was 21. He held on to the title from 1987 until 1990.
Famously though, there was a dark side, and he's as well known these days for his six-year rape conviction and for biting off Evander Holyfield's ear ("Tasted like ass," he reflected in Grudge Match) as he is for his prowess in the ring.
His story was told once before, in the TV movie Tyson where he was played by Michael Jai White. Twenty years on, however, there's considerably more narrative to add. Foxx, who's no stranger to this type of movie (Any Given Sunday, Ali), seems an excellent choice to don the gloves.
Winter is currently at work as showrunner and lead writer on Boardwalk Empire's final season, so expect movement on Untitled Tyson after that. We'll next see Foxx in the somewhat less muscular Annie, out at Christmas.